Delirious Therapy

The psychologist asked us our names and ages, and I could see mom visibly relax as we finally settled down and appeared to cooperate. “Big Bird,” I said. “I’m 36.” Mom leaned and squinted her eyes at me like she did when she was mad. My three younger siblings followed with Oscar the Grouch, Ernie, and Bert. Without any planning, we managed to make a mockery of the counseling session. We never went back.

Heartbroken from her recent divorce, Mom was doing her best to parent an angry adolescent – me, a manic middle son, and a sweet set of twins. I appreciate her effort to help us heal, but the real healing began in her old K- car. Some days I couldn’t bear to go to school, and she would see my heart and drive right past the school and towards the city. Just us. And soon, the magical place that made everything better – the mall.

We always perused the record shop, and sometimes Mom would indulge me with a new cassette tape or a 45 record. One time, we left the shop with Delirious, an Eddie Murphy tape. I had seen him in movies, so I knew he was a funny guy.

I had no idea what was coming when I slid the tape into the player and pressed play. Still adjusting to the shock of Eddie Murphy’s booming, playful voice, we were stunned to stillness by the profane and deprecating language. Mom and I stared at each other, jaws dropped and eyes wide. We stared at the tape player. I waited for her to stop it. She did not. Could not. It was like eating a poison apple. We knew it was bad, but it was so delicious. Our jaws hurt from laughing, and we could hardly sit in our chairs without slithering to the floor. I can still hear some of Eddie’s vulgar jokes and anecdotes. At one point, while mocking Mr. T, Eddie growls, “I’m gonna bend over now, and when I do, start F…..g.” And then, yeah, sound effects. This was too good to keep to ourselves.

We rewound the tape to “I’m gonna bend over now…” and picked up the phone. We began with the self-righteous neighbours. As soon as they answered the phone we hit play and covered our mouths to contain the peals of laughter as we doubled over and then slammed the receiver down after the sound effects. We moved on to my friend and then mom’s boyfriend. The poison apple grew more potent and more delicious – we gorged. Finally, we made a long-distance call to Mom’s beloved father, my grandpa. The familiar French accent queried and we did not hit play, for a second or two. I could tell Mom felt a little bad, but I’m sure Grandpa would have understood had he known about the pain and the poison apple. He’d been known to imbibe on his own poison at times, shaking his fist at old war trauma.

The drive, the mall, the shocking language, obscene phone calls, and frenzied laughter. This was our therapy. This was us shaking our fists at God and prevailing the only way we knew how. I am grateful for a God with more than enough grace to cover anger and poison apples. We’ve all bitten poison apples. We’ve all shaken our fists. We all need grace, and we all need to give it.